Crossing that Divide

Last week, I received an email advertising the $Unlimited Investment Challenge 2008. This is an event jointly organised by UK Trade & Investment and Unlimited Magazine.

Last year, Pingar was shortlisted. The experience we gained was substantial. It focused us on a number of issues around our own investment readiness. I would recommend any New Zealand business looking to raise investor funds to take part.

Over the past few weeks, I have been at the sharp end of a number of investor presentations. Certain parameters have emerged and these have been consistent.

According to the professionals, despite the global 'credit crunch', there is a lot of liquidity in the NZ investor marketplace at present. There are also a number of good investment opportunities. That's all positive. On the flip side, the number of deals actually being completed is very small. That's not so positive. It's all a bit tad confusing.

NZ investors have never been big on risk. The recent fall in property prices and the ongoing collapse of confidence in the finance company sector appears to have increased the aversion to risk. 'De-risking' an opportunity is now 'de rigour'. The problem is this can also devalue the potential upside. Bland is not always good.

It would be interesting to get a better take on the deals that have actually been completed this year in the ICT sector. Do they have any themes in common? The problem at present is not just a lack of data in this space. I guess the lack of actual deals does not help.

Securing investor funds is no easy task. The lessons learnt at the upcoming $Unlimited Investment Challenge 2008 can only help.

Start Up NZ

Start-Up Magazine is published and distributed with New Zealand’s leading business publication, Unlimited.

It features stories about and relating to New Zealand Start Up businesses that operate within the Web 2.0 space. Whatever this definition means, Pingar now features in the Start Up Directory.

Although I was aware of the magazine, it was a blog by Kris Olson, Microsoft Startup Zone Manager on the Microsoft Startup Zone that drew my attention to the portal. Based in the US, it was an interesting observation on the state of the Start Up market in New Zealand. Hats doffed then to Julie Gill and her crew at Infego for bringing this awareness to a global market.

Six Million Thoughts

It is now several months since the effective conclusion of the NZ$6 Million Investment Challenge, organised jointly by UK Trade & Invest and Unlimited Magazine.

I do not know the outcome for some of the other companies that took part and believe lessons can be learnt from this first format.

For Pingar however, the Challenge achieved its objective. It has certainly made the company more 'investment-ready' and this is paying off. Not perhaps though as the organisers intended.

A number of NZ-based angel and VC investors were lined up to assess the finalists' business plans. It would be unfair to identify them in this blog. Harsh call perhaps, but I wonder just how 'investment ready' some of these funds are, or were? Given my experience of similar UK players, there appeared to be a much more 'domestic' approach to 'global' thinking. It was almost as though global aspirations were outside the scope of the funding available.

I guess this view has been reinforced by my recent visits to the UK. The UK Technology, Innovation & Growth Forum in March supported the theory. Investor engagement was much more familiar to me and the outcomes more positive. More about that later. Those lips remain zipped!

What also struck me, particularly on this last visit, was the presence of other NZ ICT businesses in London seeking to raise finance. Their take on the current NZ investment environment mapped mine. I met them through different channels.

NZ innovation compares with the best in the world. Unless more significant opportunities to raise capital locally are put in place however, the exodus of companies seeking offshore investment can only increase. Time I think for the other side of the NZ$6 million Investment Challenge coin to look at their own 'investment readiness'. The expected 2008 version of the Challenge can only benefit.

NDA Galore

Is that Steve?

There is soooooo much I want to say after last week's meetings, but I am so NDA'd, I would have to shoot myself if I did.

We are now at the 'business end' of this UK visit. I say 'this', because I can already sense a return visit happening anytime soon. That is the way my meetings in London are turning out.

I guess it is all about 'opportunity'. I have discussed this before in previous postings, but there are opportunities I can identify here that do not exist in New Zealand. It is both a number's game and a legacy one. There is a scale here that would simply not justify similar investment in time, resource and cost back home.

I had hoped to catch up with a number of in-bound NZ companies this coming week. Unfortunately however, the planned UK Market Visit for the $NZ6 Million Investment Challenge, organised by UK Trade & Invest and Unlimited Magazine was cancelled earlier last week.

No matter. This is the last week of this trip. A number of significant meetings are scheduled which will really determine where Pingar is headed over the next few months. Behind all this, Jacqui and I still need to firm up our route back home. Hong Kong or LAX? That is the question.